11 Of The Most Helpful Resources For Creatives

As a startup founder, I often bounce around between lots of projects entering and exiting various stages of multiple businesses. I’ve started this list naming some of my favorite places to visit to stay fresh as a founder. It’s a collection of blogs, tools, and email lists. 

If you are looking to stay up to date on the trends in UI, type, design, and development, I’ll try to keep this list continuously updated. 

Product Hunt

I have visited Product Hunt almost every single day for the last few years. If I miss a day or two, I’ll catch up on the previous day I’ve missed. PH is a nice reflection of the styles and business models that are “in” or interesting at least. It is a daily feed of products, tools, and resources that are being launched. 

Dribbble

For Tweaky.io I am always looking for fresh assets and inspirations to push our vibes and styles forward. I will immediately go to Dribbble for these inspirations. I have a handful of designers that I follow. Watching my feed to see what those creators and agencies are putting out keep me on my toes. 

Reddit

Ok, when I’m not hanging out in the r/holofractal or r/Shamanism reddit, I’ll spend time in r/webdev and r/startups. Although it can be filled with braggy gunk a lot of the time, there are helpful nuggets every now and again. 

Really Good Emails

I subscribe to their newsletter. They break down email campaign design and flow. Getting emails about emails… woah.

Medium.com

So, I spend some of my time on Medium. I used to read a lot of content on Medium until they gated 75% of the featured content with a paywall. I do still go to medium to find good sources of information. If I find an article or writer I like, I’ll check out their website and channels and subscribe directly. 

5 Bullet Friday

Like every tech bro in silicon valley, I subscribe to 5-bullet Friday. That’s funny but I think it’s actually true. I enjoy watching Tim’s tastes change and develop over time. It’s also a good way to get introduced to weird and cool products. 

Kevin Rose Newsletter

I call Kevin Rose the original Tim Ferriss. It’s like they are the same person but each one branched off into a different dimension when they were presented with the decision to start a company or study companies. Kevin chose to become a tech guru. Tim chose to become a marketing guru. Here’s a fun tweet exchange we had a while ago.

 

Lol @kevinrose you copy and do everything else @tferriss does, why not copy his work ethic and get a handle on this crypto thing. 25k 🎄, 35k NYE 🎉 & 100k 4th 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/CL2R4TRBf7 — Crypto Odin [BTC⚡️] (@TheCryptoViking) December 13, 2017

Or I might be the 2nd-gen @kevinrose! #T2 — Tim Ferriss (@tferriss) December 14, 2017

The Hustle

My undying love for The Hustle has subsided from a cultish fetish to a newsletter I’ll try to read as often as possible. This lately has been like once a week. Awesome tech news. Sam, the founder, is an awesome guy. I also use their chrome browser extension snippets and which keeps me up to date on tech news every time I open a new tab.

Mixergy

This list wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t shout out to my boy Andrew Warner. The dude is consistently publishing in-depth content and amazing podcasts interviewing entrepreneurs up and down the tech and e-commerce space. Andrew and I are friends. We tried vlogging together and it was super fun and awesome but it failed. Andrew can do anything. Go get em, Andrew. 

Brain Pickings by Maria Popova

I love Maria’s voice. She spans a whole lot of topics in an engaging and intelligent way. You can browse her popular posts here. 

Signal vs. Noise

I, like many others, am a big fan of Jason Fried. Basecamp founder and friends run a blog with strong opinions that help keep me morally grounded in marketing and tech. Check out their greatest hits.